


She Gets To Stare

by gymwrites



Category: Gymnastics RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, raistafina
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-19
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-08-31 21:49:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8595028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gymwrites/pseuds/gymwrites
Summary: If Aly Raisman and Aliya Mustafina had met in another life...





	

**Author's Note:**

> A one shot (?) brought on by an anonymous ask.

**She Gets To Stare**

At first, Aly doesn’t mean to stare. And if she’s going to keep her job, she really has no time to.

The exhausted girl had clambered out of bed this morning after hitting that god-awful snooze button for the sixth time. Narrowly stopped herself from smashing it into smithereens. Swung her legs over to hit the ground - only to step on and scatter last night’s bowl of leftover popcorn. (”Shit!”) Splashed her face furiously with cold water to try and remedy the puffy eyes staring back at her in the mirror. Having given up on that particular fruitless mission, she went on to the next - extracting a non-crumpled specimen from the small mountain of shirts growing organically in the corner of her room. (Didn’t she just clear that pile a few days ago? She swears they’re reproducing by mitosis.) To top it all off, she wasted a few more precious minutes figuring out you can’t actually start the ignition of a compact Hyundai with your apartment keys. (”Shit, shit!”)

In short, a series of misfortunes that plague her everyday existence means Aly should have clocked in half an hour ago. That means Alastair would have started flipping his shit twenty-nine minutes and fifty-eight seconds ago. So yes, staring is a luxury she can’t afford right now. And yet… 

Aly suspects it has something to do with the way she deliberately strides forward in one direction, glancing inconspicuously down at her phone, only to backtrack to the same exact spot. Striking dark eyes narrowed, determined like hell not to look like she’s lost, even though she clearly is. And who could blame her? The intersection of 42nd and 7th is a veritable hive of humans who couldn’t care less about one more confused tourist. 

No, wait. From her vantage point across the road, Aly watches as a tall, ruggedly handsome man breaks the mould and steps forward to offer her assistance. His smile is so winning, it makes Aly kick herself even more for losing out on the opportunity. ( _Huh? An ‘opportunity’? For what…?_ )

The dark-eyed girl with the sweeping, ebony brown hair and pale, almost-translucent skin tilts her chin regally upwards to meet the sudden onslaught of kindness from a stranger. Aly tries reading the girl’s lips, but she’s always been really bad at that - so she has no idea why, a few seconds later, the man looks like he’s been shot in the chest. Staggering backwards, smile replaced with a look of what can only be described as pure horror, he turns away and… _scampers_ … back to his morning routine. A broken man. 

Then Aly gets it. That glare. The way it glints with the reflection of a thousand assassins’ daggers. The universal ‘ _fuck off’_  sign… except she’s taken it and made it her own, and it’s freaking terrifying.

For some reason, Aly’s body completely ignores the sign (and along with it the basics of survival) as the little green man signals her turn to cross. She finds herself drawn magnetically to the still-glaring tourist _or_   _Byzantine goddess reincarnate_  and before she can stop herself, she’s right in front of her. She takes the leap.

“Hey!”

Silence and a million death wishes are flung her way. Aly’s heart melts into oblivion. From fear or joy she has no idea, but _it doesn’t matter_. She gets to stare for just a few moments more.

It’s lucky Aly has the gift of the gab, because there’s no other way she could have covered up this continuous staring at such close proximity. So while she takes the daggers in stride and blabbers on about how she noticed the girl might possibly, but only if she wants it, need some help, and “what’s your name? I’m Aly, I work nearby”, her mind is screaming out that this has to be the most gorgeous girl she has ever laid eyes on and _oh my god looking into these eyes is like staring directly into the sun…_

Meanwhile, the other girl is experiencing the first of many ‘firsts’. For the first time in her life, she feels a real sense of panic. The loud, prattling, yet begrudgingly attractive girl offering to give her directions and even walk her to wherever she’s headed looks like, and sounds like an American, but Americans _don’t do this to her._  They don’t confusingly split her usually serene mind into two - on the one hand, wanting to run away from whatever’s causing the unfamiliar pounding in her chest, and on the other, wanting to stay glued to exactly where she is to listen to… well, _prattling_. They certainly don’t make her sound out the words threatening to roll off the very tip of her tongue…

“Aliya. My name, Aliya.”

Aly halts mid-sentence. Aliya, Aliya, Aliya, Aliya. _Of course that’s her name… how could it be any other? Aliya…_

Aly slowly repeats the girl’s name out loud, and it brings a smile to her face. The kind of smile that elicits a return and in that moment seals two hearts together, all without either one knowing.

When her brain finally realizes her mouth has involuntarily turned itself upside down into a smile, an actual blush creeps into Aliya’s cheeks, somehow making her seem more human, but at the same time no less goddess-like. Aly shakes her head. _Jesus, this girl is making me think ecclesiastically and I don’t even know_ _her._

Except it feels like she _does_ know her. Definitely not in this life, but maybe in another…?

In a physical effort to distract herself from the strange sensation of smiling at an American, Aliya lifts her phone to show Aly the address that has eluded her since getting off the subway one stop too early. Her pride takes a hit, but right this instant, a much stronger emotion - she has no idea what - is making pride sit down quietly in a corner of her mind. 

Squinting to see past the glare of daylight on the screen, Aly’s eyes brighten. 

“That’s right next to where I work!” 

It’s perfect.

Perfect for Aliya, for reasons totally and utterly beyond her, because New York’s crisp, summer air suddenly feels much less like the crushingly cold winters back home.

And perfect for Aly. She gets to stare some more.

 


End file.
